DA will seek death penalty against Eric Frein, charged with shooting troopers

Prosecutors will seek the death penalty against a man charged with killing a state trooper and seriously wounding another in a shooting outside the Blooming Grove barracks.

Eric Frein of Monroe County deserves to be executed because he murdered a law enforcement officer while in the line of duty and committed other felonies during the crime, Pike County District Attorney Ray Tonkin argued in a legal filing Tuesday.

Frein is scheduled for a formal arraignment on Thursday in Milford. It is expected the court appearance will be by video link with the Pike County Prison, according to a news release.

Frein's attorney, Michael Weinstein, could not immediately be reached for comment Tuesday.

Pennsylvania allows prosecutors to seek the death penalty in cases of the killing of a law enforcement officer in the line of duty and allege Frein committed other felonies during the shooting that includes the attempted homicide of another trooper, terrorism and possession of weapons of mass destruction, court records state.

Authorities said during the Sept. 12 killing of Cpl. Bryon Dickson, Frein also shot and wounded trooper Alex Douglass.

Earlier this month, Frein was ordered to face trial on a dozen charges including murder of a police officer and terrorism.

Frein, 31, is the lone suspect in the shooting outside the barracks that killed Dickson, 38, of Dunmore and seriously wounded Douglass, 31, of Olyphant, both boroughs in Lackawanna County.

Police said Frein then led law enforcement on a 48-day manhunt through the Poconos woods before U.S. marshals captured him Oct. 30 near an abandoned airplane hangar in Tannersville, about 30 miles from the shooting scene.

During Frein's preliminary hearing earlier this month, prosecutors showed a video of Dickson as he left his shift and suddenly dropped out of view. Douglass also appears in the video falling down and dragging himself through the barracks lobby on his elbows.